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While Ash didn't won this gym badge on a official way, he did show sportsmanship and respect for his opponent. A lot of people give him cuss for that he won most, if not all of his Kanto badges unfairly. I think if you look it from a larger perspective, you would understand that during Kanto, Ash mainly developed the beginning aspects of a trainer and the correct mentality for it, afterwards came battle tactics and experience. With that in mind, I quite enjoyed this episode and it's overall plot with some character development here and there.

A good episode, nice to see Brock's debut. I liked how Misty offered to help Ash but he refused it... so ignorant of him. Interesting to learn about Brock's family. Nice first gym battle for Ash even if he won with a little bit of luck. Ash & Misty now gained a new friend on their journey.

A good episode, nice to see Brock's debut. I liked how Misty offered to help Ash but he refused it... so ignorant of him. Interesting to learn about Brock's family. Nice first gym battle for Ash even if he won with a little bit of luck. Ash & Misty now gained a new friend on their journey.

I wouldn't call it ignorant, I certainly wouldn't want to sweep a gym using someone else's Starmie, especially if I was 10 and it was my first gym battle.

While Ash didn't won this gym badge on a official way, he did show sportsmanship and respect for his opponent. A lot of people give him cuss for that he won most, if not all of his Kanto badges unfairly. I think if you look it from a larger perspective, you would understand that during Kanto, Ash mainly developed the beginning aspects of a trainer and the correct mentality for it, afterwards came battle tactics and experience. With that in mind, I quite enjoyed this episode and it's overall plot with some character development here and there.

You can't look at it from a larger perspective when you know all about the production of the Kanto-series. The series was only going to last a year and a half. So Pallet Party Panic was going to be the last episode. That being said, all the battle tactics and experience that he would gain throughout Johto and Hoenn wasn't imagined yet during the original OS-production phase. It was just a style of writing they thought would grab the attention of their target audience, with no further development, or larger perspective in mind at all.

You can't absolve the way Ash obtained his badges in Kanto, by saying that the writers would focus on tactics and experience in later series, and that these badges were only the mere starting ground for collecting them, as those later regions weren't planned for animé-production even in the least. You could perhaps say in retrospect (and even then it wouldn't have been in the writers intent to do so during the Kanto production), but not in the larger perspective looking from this episode onwards as that wouldn't make sense.

Hope you understand, while I do agree that after they acknowledged the fact that the series was going to run longer then Kanto, that they had to delve more into development of tactics and experience, hence why Ash seemed more like a tutor to May and Dawn at times.

And eitherway, this episode had great development for Brock and showed his conflict rather well, and even gave basis for an psychoanalytical analysis of the character and why his quirks of being attracted to Joy and Jenny weren't at all random: Loss of a female role-model and nobody who initially cared for him, and gave structure to his life, when he had to give exactly those two things for his siblings.. Joy and Jenny represent care and order, something Brock in a freudian sense still needs and craves for as he didn't receive any when he was a smaller child, while having the responsibility for those two needs for his siblings.

So in a sense, when you see Brock coming onto nurse Joy, you might as well think: "Poor thing, never had a mother who cared for him when he was a child!" It's pure freudian cravings being represented when he's coming on to Jenny and Joy, that's him trying to fill in those gaps. Brock's character is actually pretty deep when you think about it that way. It's why I quite like the character even if he supposedly 'got stale'.

Originally Posted by octopusG44

It was very weird to see Geodude lose against Pikachu's Thunderbolt. Do the writers even play the games? xD Too bad these mistakes are still happening.

Still happening? xD When was the last time Electricity did damage to a Ground-type? Eitherway, for Kanto, it was understandable.. The rock-type isn't immune to Electricity, because Ground is. Brock was a Rock-type trainer. So the animé staff, which were only on board for a small year and a half series made a beginners mistake, and forgot to double check, forgetting that both Geodude and Onix are also part Ground..

Answer to all the bad things in the world: Give up on trying to make everything better. Hence, accepting it for what it is. YOLO! <- Click the link and daw.. -.-

Roark's Onix was hurt by Pikachu's Thunderbolt, and Shadow Ball caused damage to Tranquill. Ash tried to use SonicBoom on a Gengar and it dodged using Levitate. Serperior using Leer and then Solarbeam.

Originally Posted by CyberCubed

You watch this episode and you realize 600 episodes later that Brock's development was basically to abandon his role as Gym leader, then abandon his dream of a breeder, then become a doctor.

This was another bad episode, sadly. The plot was alright but handled terribly. So, Ash doesn't want to cheat by using Misty's pokemon, good. But then he cheats by generating electricity into Pikachu. Huh?

The battle was also unrealistic, the only belivable part was Pidgeotto VS Geodude. The sprinklers hitting Onix should NOT make Pikachu's attacks suddenly work. Not only that, they worked against Geodude for no reason whatsoever. But at least this introduced Brock to the show. And TR got to be somewhat entertaining.

I wonder how Pikachu felt while being wrapped twice. Spoiler:- Spoiler:

Seemed as if he felt worse being wrapped by Jalorda

It was pretty funny when he didn't want to battle, so he tried to call out Pidgeotto. I'm surprised he knew which Poke ball it was. It's also good he learned Thunderbolt as well. And seeing Ash command a Staryu/Starmie would have been wonderful. :3

This was another bad episode, sadly. The plot was alright but handled terribly. So, Ash doesn't want to cheat by using Misty's pokemon, good. But then he cheats by generating electricity into Pikachu. Huh?

The battle was also unrealistic, the only belivable part was Pidgeotto VS Geodude. The sprinklers hitting Onix should NOT make Pikachu's attacks suddenly work. Not only that, they worked against Geodude for no reason whatsoever. But at least this introduced Brock to the show. And TR got to be somewhat entertaining.

5/10

Actually, I find this episode's battles fairly realistic. The amount of heat generated by a bolt of lightening should have some effect on the ground, even if the games don't work that way.

† I am a Christian and not ashamed of it! Copy and paste this into your sig if you are too.†

What makes this episode becoming so great is the second battle of Pikachu against Onix. It was most taking advantage of the enviroment factors than personal power itself. Despite it wasn't clearly said, according to this episode ground types are immune to electricity just up to a certain voltage. Pikachu could damage Onix because the water lowered its electric resistance, so it was no longer immune to it. Plus, this episode should suggest in future generations that as long as it rains on field ground Pokemons can be hit by electric type moves.

Another interesting thing about this episode is that it shows a bit of Brock's life out of the gym (unike in later generations, that in most of the gyms you enter you just defeat the leader and goes out afterwards).

There was something about this episode that intrigued me as a child. It could've been because Brock was introduced and became part of the main cast. It might've been because Flint carried the episode through. Or it was because of Ash's determination to take on the challenge of battling gym leaders. Whichever it was, this was an episode that became a personal favorite. After watching it again for the first in a long time, I'm starting to actually question that. It's not a bad episode, it's just that more really could've been done to it, or it could've just become a two-parter.

I really am admiring Ash at this point. He may be a novice trainer, but he's determined. When an opportunity comes his way, he will take it, though it looks like he needs to be talked about it first before he decides. While I suppose it's considered cheating to overpower Pikachu like that instead of just taking him out for personal training, it goes to show Ash will do anything to be the best, even if it means taking extreme measures. Can it hurt him in the long-run? If he does it excessively.

In a form of forgiveness or something, the ending where he couldn't allow Pikachu to finish the fight correctly and didn't want to accept the badge at first is honorable. Ash may have learned to take responsibility since the previous episode, so he's being honest with himself. That is something you don't see in most ten-year-olds, though Brock had to give him a speech in order for him to accept the badge that he may or may not have rightfully earned. But as Brock is the gym leader who does enforce the rules for his gym, it's possible he liked how Ash handled everything with some maturity.

Speaking of Brock, there's not much to him in his introduction. We just know he's a gym leader who takes care of his ten brothers and sisters on the side. However, he is not cruel, and didn't want to hurt Pikachu much like how Lt. Surge brutally fought his opponents. Before he revealed what he really wanted to do, we could assume from that act alone that he really cares for Pokémon and the trainers he's challenging. But unfortunately, we never see Brock do much outside of what we saw him do, so we can only just take his word for it. Also, Eric Stuart sounded bored in this episode. Did he just not expect Brock to be as prevalent as he is, or was he doing it just for the paycheck? Whatever the reason, I'm happy that he does get better overtime, though I wonder if he still has this bored tone for the next few episodes.

Flint was more-or-less the driving force behind this episode. He may have done off-screen things like leave his family out of shame, yet he was the temporary “mentor” to Ash. He may say that Ash reminded him of himself when he was a trainer himself, but his methods were... questionable. Unless that is all he knows, and that's what he did to make up for his weakness? Either way, there should have been something else that could've worked in place of hooking Pikachu up to a machine to power up his electric power. It seems like throughout the first season, Pikachu is being fed electricity to become stronger, no?

If the beginning is anything to go by, it sounds like Jessie, James, and Meowth are novices at their job. I don't believe we were ever told how long they've been with the team, but it feels like to me that the trio have suddenly been demoted to being the butt of the joke the last two episodes. I do recall them getting back to normal later for a while, but I suppose we had to see them for who they are at some point. They really do have this strong chemistry about them that though it's accentuated in later episodes, it's still present here.

The ending was admittedly funny, as it's something that an actual boy would do to a girl. “Let's try to lose her!” And then Brock is apparently all for it. Oh yeah, the makings of a strong friendship.

So going back through this episode, I can see why I liked it so much as a kid, but it's still not as good as how the first episode was. Definitely an improvement from the previous episode in terms of enjoyment and action, however. The plot moved a bit too quickly here than it should have, but what's done is done, and it worked for the most part.

And yes, the inconsistency of the script in having Brock's mother dead is worth noticing in hindsight. So I suppose mentioning death is taboo, but having both parents be "dead-beats" is just as bad and thus they had to go with the lesser of two evils. Though can you really blame 4KIDS for not thinking ahead of the possibility of his mother showing up? If Pokémon was originally planned for one season, would there really have been enough space to go into every single main character's backstory or having their past catch up to them or whatnot? Just something to think about.

And eitherway, this episode had great development for Brock and showed his conflict rather well, and even gave basis for an psychoanalytical analysis of the character and why his quirks of being attracted to Joy and Jenny weren't at all random: Loss of a female role-model and nobody who initially cared for him, and gave structure to his life, when he had to give exactly those two things for his siblings.. Joy and Jenny represent care and order, something Brock in a freudian sense still needs and craves for as he didn't receive any when he was a smaller child, while having the responsibility for those two needs for his siblings.

So in a sense, when you see Brock coming onto nurse Joy, you might as well think: "Poor thing, never had a mother who cared for him when he was a child!" It's pure freudian cravings being represented when he's coming on to Jenny and Joy, that's him trying to fill in those gaps. Brock's character is actually pretty deep when you think about it that way. It's why I quite like the character even if he supposedly 'got stale'.

You learn something new every day.

So, the episode we get introduced to Brock, in all his squinty-eyed glory!
As well as the introduction of the original group of Ash, Brock and Misty.

I still love how cheap Ash was in this battle. It caught me very off guard that the show actually did something like this as I really had a very different idea of what the show was! Too funny!

Someone once told me that Misty's cameos in Advanced Generation help make it easier knowing that she is no longer a series regular. They couldn't have been more wrong. After she leaves behind Togepi she returns to her gym more alone than ever AND ON TOP OF THAT, her last cameo was in 2005. 2005!?!?!? ITS BEEN TEN YEARS SINCE ONE OF THE CAST WHO STARTED THE SHOW WAS ACTUALLY ON THE SHOW!?!?

I really preferred seeing Brock's serious side here; it was good to see him as a competent battler as well. I disliked that Ash didn't get to finish the match though due to Brock's siblings showing up. I also cackled at 4Kids changing the fate of Brock's mom. Anyway, the ending with Ash running from Misty after Brock joined him was funny.

And I think Pikachu's Thunderbolt was so supercharged that it could affect ground types as well.

Or it was just convenient writing. I don't think that Pikachu's power being increased by Flint's training method was a good justification for Pikachu's Electric-type attack affecting Geodude for instance.

- Ash wanted to win a badge "all by himself" without Misty's help... so he got help from some random guy, and electrocuted his Pikachu to increase its power and this somehow worked... Wow. It's moments like this where Ash should learn some kind of lesson but instead he seems to get away with acting like a jerk often this season.
- It was way irresponsible of Brock to be so trusting of his father with his siblings, especially since his father ran off and Brock hadn't seen him in years.
- Ash got his first undeserved badge.

It would have been much better for Ash to learn about type advantages here and catch a Pokemon that would fare better against Brock, but instead we got a sob story done terribly wrong.

I appreciated how Misty offered to help Ash fight Brock and how Ash was stubborn and went to battle on his own. Flint's training method to help power Pikachu up seemed cool and I just wish that Ash had won the battle without so much convenience. ^^;

When I watched this episode, there seemed to be something that didn't really make sense to me; Ash using Pikachu's extra-powered Thunderbolt on Onix along with a burst sprinkler and KOing Onix because of that. Seems that type matchups weren't considered a lot in this episode.

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